Nick Champion (Wakefield, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on Appropriation Bill (No. 3) 2010-2011 and Appropriation Bill (No. 4) 2010-2011. I have listened very carefully to the member for Goldstein’s appropriation speech and his reference to meeting for three hours with the Treasury secretary. All I can say is that I feel sorry for the Treasury secretary. He had to endure what we have had to endure, which is just a tepid audition by the member for Goldstein to take the member for North Sydney’s job. It is a shockingly transparent attempt to audition for another position within the shadow cabinet. The member for Goldstein talked a bit about the cuts that the opposition are going to make, and I would like to talk about the cuts to foreign aid in particular.

There is in these appropriation bills an appropriation relating to foreign aid, which is a very important part of Australia’s international commitment. Australia has reached arrangements with other countries to provide resources to combat poverty, malaria and other blights on this world. Of course, the coalition parties are proposing to defer, as I understand it, $448 million of foreign aid to Indonesian schools. That might sound good in a One Nation email or when you are shouting it out in a shopping centre or in the front bar of a hotel. No doubt you would get a lot of heads nodding, because it is understandable that people would want to look after their own first. But if you make the counter-argument and say to people, ‘Would you support Australia welshing on its deals, welshing on its words, welshing on its commitment?’ they would probably say no. What if you said to people, ‘Should we invite the Taliban to our doorstep?’ We have to remember that ‘talib’ means student. The Taliban drew their ranks from the schools and from young men who were made refugees by the Russian invasion of Afghanistan. We know that schools can produce educated, moderate people who are committed to economic growth and peace and justice in this world, but we know also from the Afghanistan experience that they can produce soldiers and movements and colour a nation’s politics and put the gun into a nation’s politics.

It was John Howard who put the education aid scheme in place. It was not the Labor government; it was John Howard and Alexander Downer. And we know that Alexander Downer does not think much of the coalition’s referrals and does not think much of them walking away from this very important Howard government program. According to the Sydney Morning Herald on 11 February this year, Alexander Downer said it was ‘a filthy proposal’ to defer the assistance that we might provide to Indonesian schools.

We know that his successor in the seat of Mayo, Jamie Briggs—a very able coalition member—called on the party to retain the funding. He broke ranks on ABC radio the day before the funding cut was announced. He said the programs were designed to prevent terrorism and the rise of extremism in Islamic schools in our nearest neighbour. He said that the axing of that program, the cuts that were proposed by Tony Abbott and his shadow cabinet, were a bad idea. They are a terrible idea. The foreign minister has said that the only winner is Abu Bakar Bashir, but I fear that that would be the least of our problems if we allowed schools in our region to be radicalised by extremists, by people who seek to promote extremism. So we know that this was a terrible decision by the coalition. We really cannot believe they would propose it, that they would propose welshing on a deal, that they would take something out of a One Nation email and propose it in the parliament of this country, in the politics of this country. We now know it is all part of a broader strategy to appeal to the darker angels in our nature, to run not so much a dog whistle but a megaphone in the shopping centres and pubs of this country, to say that it is all right to be bigoted, all right to take a short-term view and all right to be reactionary. It is not all right. It is actually against our national interest. It is a terrible blight on our national interest. The coalition should think very carefully about the cuts they proposed and the impact they would have on our national circumstances. I think it is just terrible. They should rethink what they are doing.

Also in this appropriations bill is $10.1 million for the Fair Entitlements Guarantee, which is part of delivering on Labor’s commitment to improving GEERS, increasing redundancy protection to up to four weeks pay per year of service rather than the previous cap of 16 weeks, removing access to financial assistance for company directors or excluded employees and making sure that this scheme is preserved in legislation, as opposed to just being set up under regulations or by government fiat. It is a very important thing. There have been a lot of contests in the community about unpaid entitlements, and I know this from my own experience of meeting with the lead union in this area, the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union. I have met with John Camillo many times about unpaid entitlements, and I have also met many times with Jon Gee, the secretary of the vehicle division. Jon is a very passionate advocate of making sure that people’s entitlements are secured, a passionate advocate of the car industry in my state and a passionate advocate of the Holden GMH plant at Elizabeth, which of course lies in the heart of my electorate. He came to see me only the other day with Paul Brown, Heinz Joham and other delegates at the plant. They came to meet me, obviously about the future of the car industry. We know that we have the new Holden Cruze coming online, a new car rolling off the line. It is a symbol, I think, just as when Ben Chifley waved the first Holden off the line. It is a symbol of progress, a symbol of our nation’s ability to make things. It is a symbol in these troubled times, when the country is buffeted by the global financial crisis and by the troubles in the international car industry. It is a sign that this plant can prosper and survive in the most difficult of circumstances. Of course, the union, led very ably by John Camillo and Jon Gee, continue in the strongest possible manner to put forward their views about how we might secure even more production at Holden’s Elizabeth plant and in the car industry generally.

We know that it is of tremendous importance to my local community. One in four workers in the city of Playford is a manufacturing worker. We are a city that makes things. We are a town—Elizabeth is still a town—that makes things, and it is important for this country to manufacture and export cars. We know that, despite all the difficulties that we faced through the GFC—and there were many sacrifices made by workers in that plant, sacrifices that they made together to preserve one another’s jobs and to make sure that the plant got through a difficult time in General Motors history—all of those sacrifices were based around the future of the car industry and making sure that Holden is still there in 10, 20 or 30 years time making cars for this nation, making cars for places like Bathurst and the hill.

In the time I have left I want to talk about a couple of events. Recently I attended a family day to welcome 7RAR, some 1,200 troops who were relocating from Darwin down to RAAF Base Edinburgh. It was a terrific day. His Excellency Rear Admiral Kevin Scarce, the Governor of the state of South Australia, attended, along with Kevin Foley, the relevant state minister; Group Captain Reg Carruthers; Michael Callan, Director General of the Defence Community Organisation; and Lieutenant Colonel Michael Garraway, who is the commander of 7RAR. They all attended that day, along with many soldiers and their families. It was a wonderful thing. There was an expo-like feel. Many of the local community organisations turned out to provide their services and to endeavour to encourage the soldiers to join in community life. There is at least one rugby club that is bidding for new players, and I am sure it will find a good pool of new players which will improve rugby in my state. It does need an improvement. We are predominantly an Aussie Rules state, and I am sure we will get a few players there for the local clubs as well. It was terrific to be down there to be part of one of the first events to welcome these soldiers to our local area. I look forward to meeting them again and, in particular, to seeing the improvements that they bring to RAAF Base Edinburgh. We know that the transition has not been entirely without its issues and difficulties, but it is very important both for the country and the defence forces and for 7RAR for that move to occur.

Finally, I want to praise the Nicholls family, who are an absolute institution down at the Elizabeth Vale Soccer Club. More than one generation has participated in the club’s life. The bar in the club is named the Nicholls Bar. I would like to praise David Nicholls in particular, who for the past 45 years has been part of that club and has played 900 games for the division 1 A-grade, reserves, C-grade and the over-35s side. His contribution just in playing football—or soccer, as some would call it—is absolutely unparalleled. It is good to see someone out there playing at that age. It puts some of us, including me, to shame. I think it is an absolutely sterling contribution. Of course, it is not just on the field that he has contributed. He has coached junior teams, reserve sides and the senior women’s side with great success. He has been the chairman of the senior and junior teams committees. I am sure that even though his playing days are now ended he will continue to be a big part of this club, just like his brother Roger Nicholls, who is an absolute stalwart not just of the Elizabeth Vale Soccer Club but of the shop assistants union—a person I have often relied upon for his good judgment and for his counsel not just in union affairs but in my own conduct as the local representative in this parliament. The Nicholls family is one of those families that you are proud of and proud to be associated with, and I would like to congratulate both David Nicholls and Roger Nicholls for being great South Australians.

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